


A Realistic Average

by lazarusthefirst



Series: Trope bingo [12]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Drinking, F/F, Gaming, M/M, Online Relationship, Shit Talk, gamer!stiles, gaming tournament, mentions of past Stiles/Danny - Freeform, minor Cora/Lydia/Allison
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-08
Updated: 2015-09-08
Packaged: 2018-04-19 20:00:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4759133
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lazarusthefirst/pseuds/lazarusthefirst
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek scanned the leaderboard. It was written in tiny white on black writing, but Derek could just make out Cora’s username “LittleWolf” underneath what looked like a combination of digits and an alphabet sneeze.<br/>‘Who the hell is “St1l1nsk1”?’</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Realistic Average

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Sybilina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sybilina/gifts).



> This is a very late birthday present for my dear pal [Sybilina](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Sybilina/) who is utterly wonderful and likes games
> 
> Note: I took a few creative liberties with games, consoles, and the capabilities of Steam and online gaming to suit my own purposes. I didn't go into too much detail so non-gamers won't be in any way confused. Also I'm a console gamer so no offence meant to any PC fans <3 we're all friends here

Derek was usually quite good at handling his college stressors - exams, deadlines, no money left for dinner on a Friday - but day three of getting sexiled by Kira and her mysterious partner had put him in a thoroughly bad mood.

Derek hadn't even met the guy and already he didn't like him. Kira may appear sweet and innocent, but she sure could rack up favours like every good loan shark, and right now she was calling them in at least once a day, leaving Derek to grab whatever books he could and retreat to the library the moment she smiled sheepishly at him.

So far these trysts hadn't encroached on his sleeping time, but right now it was 10pm, he was finished up in the library, and he was looking at snapchat from Kira that was just a sock on their door handle.

'Fuck,' Derek said, staring at it. He'd been gone for four hours already, how were they still at it? He didn’t know whether to be annoyed or envious.

There was no point asking her to hurry it up. A favour was a favour. But this was definitely the last time he let Kira bring him coffee and Chipotle in bed when he was hungover.

He glanced at his phone. Cora hadn't replied to his SOS, which meant she was either out drinking or playing video games. But it was still worth a trip to her dorm room.

The trek across campus to the building he and Cora lived in took about twenty minutes. It was early March and quiet, with most students enjoying the latter half of their post-assignments week off before returning to cram for finals. The first half of the week had been almost totally consumed by drinking, and Derek had been no exception. But unlike apparently everyone else, he wanted to get a jump start on exams, so while everyone else was balls deep in Netflix and chill, Derek was bitching that the library didn't stay open later than 10 on a Saturday.

‘Cora, let me in,’ he demanded, knowing that his sister gamed wearing Turtle Beaches so a significant amount of pounding on the door was necessary. ‘Cora!’

He waited a few moments, then tried the handle.

‘Cora Hale, continuing to shatter the average on home invasions,’ he muttered, pushing his way into the apartment.

Cora was sitting with her back to the door, curled up on her chair and staring at her tv screen intently. Her controller lay discarded on the console at her elbow.

Derek dumped his bag before alerting her to his presence. Cora just about leapt out of her chair when he tapped her shoulder.

‘Fuck, I need to start locking my door,’ she muttered, rubbing her chest. ‘Or put a bell on you.’

‘I called like five times,’ Derek said mildly, sitting on the desk beside her.

She raised an eyebrow at him, setting her headphones aside. ‘You get sexiled again?’

Derek nodded. ‘Yep.’

‘Third time this week, huh?’

‘Third time,’ Derek agreed. ‘But hopefully the last.’ He picked up the soft basketball beside his leg and tossed it from hand to hand. ‘Cool if I study here for a while?’

Cora shrugged. ‘Yeah, it’s fine. I’ve been stuck on this for hours. Probably gonna give up soon and order some pizza. You want in?’

Derek figured it was safe to assume he wouldn’t be getting access to his own refrigerator any time soon.

‘Sure,’ he agreed. ‘Thanks.’ He craned around to look at her screen. ‘What is that, study?’

Cora snorted. ‘Nah, I finished that ages ago. I’m stuck on this one goddamn campaign, this one dude keeps killing me before I can get to the final checkpoint and I can’t figure out how to get around him.’ She glared at the screen resentfully as though someone were really out to get her. ‘It’s the last achievement. I want it.’

Derek frowned at the screen. ‘Another video game?’

Cora nodded, running her fingers through her hair. ‘Only been out three days. Local developer. I was one of the beta testers, so I’ve gotta be at least top three in the rankings.’

‘And are you?’

Cora stared at the screen for so long that Derek thought she wasn’t going to answer.

‘I’m number two,’ she said, finally.

Derek whistled, and tossed the ball into the small basketball hoop on the back of the door. ‘So that’s why you’re in on a Saturday night instead of out living your actual real life. Who’s on top?

Cora grumbled and glared at the screen again. ‘Some loser. I only know his gamertag, some made-up name with a bunch of numbers in it.’

She clicked a few buttons on the controller and then gestured irritably. ‘There he is.’

Derek scanned the leaderboard. It was written in tiny white on black writing, but Derek could just make out Cora’s username “LittleWolf” underneath what looked like a combination of digits and an alphabet sneeze.

‘Who the hell is “St1l1nsk1”?’

Cora shrugged. ‘I say it like “Slinky”, ‘cause he’s a slippery bastard. And I don’t know. I only know that he’s beating me and I’m stuck on this one last achievement. It’s total bullshit.’

Derek raised his eyebrows. ‘Well, second’s not so bad.’

‘Shut up, Derek,’ Cora said calmly. ‘If you’re gonna stay you’re not gonna talk like a punk bitch.’

Derek held up his hands in surrender. ‘Sure, sure. But take a break soon, ok? Your eyes will go square from staring at the screen.’

‘You are such an old man,’ Cora muttered, picking up her headphones again.

Derek got about an hour and a half worth of study done before Cora threw her controller away and disappeared into her room after waving irritably at him.

Derek tried to return to his work, but the game kept making a repetitive swoosh noise. Evidently, Cora’s headphones had come unplugged and she hadn’t bothered to turn off the game properly.

Derek frowned. If he knew Cora - and he did - she would probably crash for the bare minimum of hours before dragging her ass up again to attack the problem. And she really needed her sleep, especially after running herself into the ground so much over her assignments.

The game made the swoosh noise again, and Derek set down his pencil. No wonder Cora was so irritated if she kept hearing that over and over again.

Abandoning his work, he got up and had a look at the screen. The game was asking him if he wanted to try again. Derek looked at the controller, not entirely sure which symbol meant yes and which meant no.

He guessed, and guessed wrong.

Suddenly the game was loading back into the mission. Derek grabbed the headphones and crammed them into the jack so Cora wouldn’t hear the noise and come to investigate.

He tried to exit the game, but was immediately shot and killed.

‘What, already?’ He frowned at the screen, sitting down. ‘Ok, how do I - oh no.’

He was back in the mission again. This time he actually managed to make the character move, but he had no idea where he was going. Seconds before the screen went red and faded to black, Derek caught sight of the tiny writing at the bottom. Instructions?

Derek glanced at Cora’s closed bedroom door. He could at least give it a go. Just to see.

He put Cora’s headphones on, just in case there were audio instructions too. As he loaded the mission again, a little alert on the bottom of the screen caught his attention.

“St1l1nsk1 is online”.

So Derek wasn’t the only one burning the midnight oil. Well, he was logged on as Cora anyways. Derek suddenly hoped very much that this Slinky person couldn’t see how badly Derek was doing. Cora would kill him.

It took him another five deaths to figure out how to move and jump, and another three before he could shoot anything. Derek was feeling like his hands might be too big for the controller when he finally got his first kill.

‘Yes!’ he said, surprising himself. He glanced at Cora’s door, wondering if her creepy sister senses were waking her up because he was messing with her stuff.

When he looked back at the screen, he was dead.

‘Dammit,’ he muttered. ‘Ok. One more time.’

Derek might be bad at games, but he wasn’t stupid. It didn’t take him long (well, _too_ long) to figure out the aim of the mission. The instructions might have been written at the bottom of the screen but Derek discovered there was a lot more to it than just getting from A to B and killing a bunch of bad guys.

Another notification pinged in his ear and Derek abruptly died.

‘Dammit!’ he said again, as his characters blood splattered quite unnecessarily across the screen. This time it was a message notification from the Slinky thing.

“ _Still stuck on that […]_ ”

The message trailed off. Derek would have to click on it if he wanted to see more.

‘No thanks, I’m busy,’ he muttered. ‘Ok, restart…’

Two hours and two unanswered messages from the Slinky later, Derek sat back and rubbed his eyes.

 **“Achievement Unlocked”** appeared serenely at the bottom of the screen. Derek felt an odd sense of pride; he’d never understood the sense of accomplishment that Cora talked about when she completed a video game. He felt more productive than when he’d finished his first year thesis.

He was allowed to bask, right?

Derek managed to manoeuvre his way out to the console menu and found the messages he’d been ignoring, trying not to feel too pleased with himself as he did so. Two were jibes about still being stuck on the mission, but the third, which had just popped in, was different.

" _And the last horse has finally crossed the finish line. Congrats hot stuff. Check your inventory - sent u a little something :)._ ”

Derek had to remind himself that it was stupid to be excited by a virtual reward. And that he hadn't really done anything anyways. And that it was _Cora_ the guy was calling "hot stuff", not Derek.

Sure he knew all of this, but he still had a silly grin on his face when Cora stumbled out of her room, pale and ruffled and cracking her knuckles.

'Ok I'm ready, I'm going for it this time Derek.'

She blinked, hands falling by her sides.

'What are you doing in my chair? Why are you wearing my - _what did you do to my game?'_

Derek mumbled his innocence as Cora knocked the headphones off him and grabbed the controller frantically.

'I swear to god Derek, if you fucked me here I'll straight up murder you twice,' she said, sounding close to panic. Derek didn't know how to tell her he beat the game without sounding too pleased for her to allow him to survive, but Cora's eyes were widening as she scanned the screen.

'No shit,' she whispered. 'No SHIT. Is this for real?'

She turned her incredulous glare on Derek, who melted into the chair and mumbled something like 'I guess'.

Cora slammed the controller down and ran her hands through her hair, and Derek figured he should have known this was a huge record that she wanted to beat, an achievement that only she could collect.

Cora wheeled Derek's chair around until he was facing her. She got right up in his face and fixed him with her ultra death stare and said ‘How did you do it.'

Derek swallowed. 'I just did it.'

'Do not bullshit me, Derek Hale.' Her breath smelled like pop tarts. Derek knew she kept a stash in her room and ate them cold for urgent sugar rush needs. 'You can't play video games for shit. You get your thumbs tangled when you text. So how the fuck did you get this piece of shit achievement that's been ruining my life.'

'You were in there for a long time!' Derek protested indignantly, pointing at her door. 'I was bored so I learned the rules and, I dunno, I just did it. It was just luck.’

Cora leaned back and ran the back of her hand over her mouth. Sure, he was starting to get the whole video game hype, but Cora was starting to look unhinged.

'Look, maybe you should try to get some more sleep,' he tried, but Cora cut him off with a flick of her hand.

'Show me,' she said, pointing at the controller. 'Do it again.'

Derek did, only because he thought she might actually put her fist through something if he didn't.

'Shit,' she whispered, leaning over his shoulder as Derek passed the final checkpoint. 'You really fucking did it.'

'I did,' confirmed Derek, eyeing her to gauge her reaction. 'Are you mad?'

Finally a brilliant, if slightly deranged grin split his sister's face.

'No, I'm not mad,' she said. 'I'm about to pass out but I'm not mad.' She clapped Derek on the shoulder and gave a hoarse little cry of triumph. 'Shit, Derek! Ok, you gotta come back here tomorrow night. I've got _plans.'_

 _'_ Why?' said Derek, instantly suspicious.

Cora stretched, cracking what sounded like every bone in her back loudly. 'You'll see,' she yawned, all the fight suddenly gone out of her. 'Just be ready to do whatever you just did again, but in a different way.’

Derek was too tired to fight it so he just shrugged helplessly and agreed.

As he gathered his stuff and prepared to leave, he heard Cora kicking open the bathroom door and saying 'I can NOT believe you fucking did it.'

 

* * *

 

 

Stiles dropped into the bench beside Scott and punched his shoulder in greeting. 'Dude, she fucking did it.'

'No she didn't,' said Lydia, pointedly turning a page in her magazine.

'Ok, look, how do you know?' retorted Stiles, gesturing with his hand. 'She was working on it all night, and she finally got it. Lydia, I _watched_ her do it.'

'You saw the notification and her gamer tag,' Lydia said, glancing up. Scott was looking back and forth between them, a spoonful of frozen yoghurt halfway to his mouth. 'Her strategy hadn't changed for ten hours straight, then she suddenly reverts to playing like she'd never picked up a controller before, and all of a sudden she gets the win?' Lydia shook her head. 'I'm calling bullshit.’

'Oh, what do you care anyways,' stiles muttered irritably, pulling out a wrapped hoagie from his bag pack.

'This is the video game thing, right?' Scott asked carefully, once he'd taken care of that spoonful of yogurt.

'Yeah the video game thing, my dream girl, my future happiness, all of that,' Stiles said casually, unwrapping his sandwich and forcing roughly half of it into his mouth.

'Bet your dream girl would love that look,' Lydia smirked, glancing over the top of her magazine at him.

Stiles swallowed with enormous difficulty. 'Of course she would!' he replied indignantly.

'You don't know who she is,' Scott pointed out.

Stiles waved his hand. 'Details.'

'Oh please,' Lydia said, finally putting down her magazine. 'It's Cora Hale. You're all idiots.'

Stiles nearly dropped his sandwich. 'Wait, who? Speak very slowly and clearly.'

Lydia sighed. 'Cora hale. She's in my economics class. Never stops talking about video games, and I know she’s been beta testing something.’

Stiles' expression went dreamy. 'Cora Hale,' he murmured. 'She's perfect.'

'She's gay,' said Lydia, returning to her magazine.

Stiles gaped at her as Scott dissolved into laughter.

'No!' he gasped, dismayed. 'No, that's - aw, man.' He dropped his head in his hands. 'That's so hot.'

'Shut up Stiles.' Lydia threw an edamame pod at his head, but she was smiling. 'You still have hope. That wasn't her last night.’

‘Maybe,’ grumbled Stiles, staring moodily at his lunch.

They were sitting on one of the picnic benches outside the campus cafe area. It was quiet, with most of the patrons being either hungover or attempting to sleep on the tables.

'Dude, where's Malia these days?' Stiles asked Scott, casting around for a topic that wasn't his doomed love life. 'She, like, disappeared last week.'

Scott shrugged. ‘She’s your roommate. Maybe she has a project or something?'

Stiles snorted. 'If Malia had a project, I'd know.' That was putting it mildly. Malia did a lot of life art, and Stiles was frequently used as a prop, model, and sometimes canvas. Apparently he had all the right angles or something.

'She try to get a mould of your penis again?'

Stiles rubbed the back of his neck. 'I think I might have let her do that while I was drunk last week.'

Scott bust up laughing. 'Oh man, why did she want that again? She called it something great, what was it?'

'A realistic average,' Lydia answered immediately.

'Don't you have math to do or something?' Stiles shot back, as Scott threw back his head laughing. Lydia made kissy noises at him before replying 'I'm waiting for Allison. We're getting lunch.'

'Oh cool, can I -'

'No.'

 

Stiles fidgets through the rest of his classes, thinking only of getting back to his rom and shooting Cora Hale another message. Maybe she'd replied to one of his, maybe not. He probably should stop messaging her at some stage, but she might have been too psyched or too tired to message back last night. He'd give contact one more go before accepting that she didn't want to be friends, then cry into a box of cereal for thirty six hours and move on.

There was one message waiting for him when he got back. Stiles wasn't sure how accurate Lydia's intel on Cora being gay was but this chick was cool and Stiles was pretty much desperate for any new friendship that he didn't have by default from high school.

The message was brief: "Thanks. It was hard. I don't know how to check inventory."

Stiles sat back in his chair and sighed. 'Yeah, it's not her.'

The fight went out of him for a while, and he pottered around making bits and pieces of half-hearted meals and kind of organising his shoes until finally he went back to his computer and glared at the message.

'I'm so conflicted,' he murmured. 'On the one hand, you did something awesome. On the other hand, you're clearly an idiot who can't work the game and probably just got lucky.'

In the end, Stiles' careful assessment of the well-known high probability of meeting a queer student at the BH university, and the likelihood of Cora (if she was indeed gay) having a Stiles-friendly pal hanging around the place - paled in comparison to just how horny and bored Stiles was.

" _On a scale of one to Cora Hale_ ," Stiles typed out, " _how Cora Hale are you?_ "

 

* * *

 

 

Derek's phone buzzed.

'What?' he answered.

'Ok you seriously did a number on Slinky.' Cora's voice sounded like she was crunching on multiple pop tarts. 'He sent me another message. I assume you responded to one of his.'

Derek opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to decide how he felt about this.

‘Ok, but,’ he said eventually, ‘what did he say?'

Cora had a certain tone of voice that she used in the same way someone might grab a dude's balls and squeeze, just to make him squirm and fear for his life.

'Why do you want to know?' she asked, in precisely that tone of voice. Derek had vague flashbacks to when he was eight and Cora was five and she'd caught him trying on their mom's lipstick.

'Because it's my private conversation, Cora.' Derek was hanging out in the stairs of the library; there was no one else about, and the guilt in his voice echoed loudly in the hall. 'It's none of your business.'

'So many incorrect statements,' Cora said. ‘First, it's my gamer tag, and it’s my account that he's messaging, so your messages are not only my business, they’re also my property. Secondly, he thinks it's ME he's messaging. So it's doubly my business.'

Derek paused. 'Wait, he thinks it’s you? He thinks you're the shitty gamer who apparently stroked out for two hours and couldn't play the game, and also couldn't open her inventory?'

'Yes.'

'And you're ok with that.'

There was a brief silence punctuated by rapid clicking.

'Ok fine, now he knows it's not me.'

Derek felt weirdly relieved. 'But does he know it's me, specifically?’

'Nope. Bye, bitch.’

 

* * *

 

 

'It's not her, you were right and I was wrong, how do I fix this.'

'Stiles, you sound like you're at a funeral,' Lydia said down the phone.

Stiles was lying on his bed contemplating a third serving of vodka. 'I'm grieving what could have been.'

Lydia tsked. 'Can you ask her for their gamer tag?’

Stiles filled his cheeks with air and exhaled loudly into the mouthpiece of his phone. 'I highly doubt they have one.'

Lydia sounded like she was only half paying attention. 'What did her message say?'

Stiles rolled around to glare at his computer. 'I asked on a scale of one to Cora Hale, how Cora Hale are you?'

Lydia snorted softly.

'And then they replied "I am not and never will be as cool as Cora Hale."' He sighed. 'I don't know how I allowed myself to be so fixated on person. Their technique - once they fucking figured out how to play the game - was just so interesting. I was observing them the whole time, I literally witnessed the birth of their gaming brain. It was a religious experience, Lydia.'

Lydia didn't sound half as interested in this as Stiles did. ‘Is there any possibility that just _asking_ Cora would help?’

Technically yes, but nothing in Stiles’ life was ever that straightforward.

‘I’ll _try_ ,’ complained Stiles, remaining completely immobile. ‘Probably won’t work, though.’

‘How about if it doesn’t work, we all go out and get you laid.’

Stiles perked up slightly. ‘I’m on board with that. And if it does work?’

‘Uh, you probably get laid anyways?’

If sex was money, Stiles would have dollar signs on his eyeballs. ‘I’m on it,’ he said, hanging up and half-falling off the bed.

 

* * *

 

 

Cora was listening to The Naked and Famous and struggling to zip her black leather skirt up over her little poptart-tummy, when the music on her phone dimmed momentarily to allow the little _boop boop_ notification tone.

Her gaming account was linked to her phone, and even though Cora knew it could be any number of people messaging her on the game, a tiny, niggling, Derek-y voice in the back of her mind whispered that she knew _exactly_ who it was.

She picked up her phone and clicked into the message, eyes rolling further back in her head the more she read.

‘Now entering loser town,’ she muttered as she thumbed into her phone contacts. ‘Population: two. Congratulations, Derek.’

 

* * *

 

 

Derek was listening to The Offspring and feeling sorry for himself. Classes started back tomorrow. Any sensible college student was getting blackout drunk somewhere, and right now the prospect of doing just that was looking more and more attractive.

‘Your phone’s ringing,’ Kira called, knocking on his door gently.

Derek nearly asked her to bring it in, but stopped himself just in time.

Seeing Cora’s name on his phone felt like a beacon of hope, which, Derek knew, was incredibly pathetic. He answered cautiously as Kira danced around the living room sipping from a red party cup and brushing her hair with incredible grace.

‘What is it?’

‘Judging by the fact that you’re not out and don’t sound drunk, I’m going to do you a solid,’ Cora said, who definitely sounded like she’d been drinking. ‘Just for tonight, I’m going to give you my login details, and you’re going to talk to Slinky, or bang him, or whatever you need to do to get it out of your system.’

‘Cora - ‘

‘And after tonight,’ Cora continued, as though he hadn’t spoken, ‘if you don’t have his number, that’s it, you’re cut off. Tough shit.’

This was actually a very nice offer presented as a mild threat and kind of an insult too (as if Derek couldn’t get his number in one night?). Derek didn’t know whether to thank her or tell her to fuck herself.

‘Uh, ok. Cora - ‘

‘It’s fine, I know, it’s fine,’ Cora said impatiently. ‘I’ll text you the deets and then log out. Good luck, or whatever.’

Derek sat down at the table and spun his phone around a few times, waiting for his sister to text him. Not a new low, but definitely a low. Still, he was kind of excited for no reason. No reason at all.

‘You coming out?’ Kira asked him, bopping back into the room, music playing from her phone in the pocket of her dressing gown.

Derek’s phone buzzed. He looked up at Kira, suddenly smiling.

‘Uh, no. I’ve got plans.’

 

* * *

 

 

Stiles was screaming out the chorus of “Ironic”, and then mumbling the verses into the bottle of vodka because he didn’t know the words.

‘Dude, you need to stop drunk Skype-calling me,’ Scott protested, but Stiles could see him grinning on the laptop.

‘Ssh, this is the best part,’ Stiles said. ‘IT’S LIKE RAAAAAAIN ONYOURWEDDING DAAAAAY.’

‘This is why you’re not allowed to listen to Alanis Morissette.’

‘I don’t listen to her, she listens to me,’ slurred Stiles. He wasn’t even that drunk, really. He’d been steadily consuming pizza at twice the rate of vodka, but now the pizza was gone and only vodka remained, and decisions had to be made.

‘Dude, come out with us,’ persisted Scott. Stiles could see Lydia and Allison in the background holding cups.

‘I can hear Isaac complaining about the alcohol,’ Stiles said, shaking his finger. ‘Not here for that. Besides, I’ve got plans. Wait, hold on - IT’S LIKE RAAAAAAAIN ONYOURWEDDING DAAAAAAY.’

‘ _Make him stop!’_ yelled Isaac.

‘This is for you, Isaac!’ Stiles yelled back. Scott had his head in his hands.

‘Dude, just, don’t do anything stupid tonight, ok?’ he asked, looking pained. Stiles was swaying mournfully to the music now, holding the vodka like a baby. ‘Call me if you feel like you’re gonna be stupid, ok?’

Stiles nodded. ‘Sure, sure.’

‘Hey,’ said Allison, ducking into frame. ‘And if you see your dumb roommate, tell her to stop avoiding us and come to Sapphire.’

‘I cannot control what Malia Tate does,’ Stiles said firmly. ‘But I’ll pass that along.’

Scott signed off with a worried crease on his forehead as the others toasted loudly in the background. Stiles felt mildly disappointed he wasn’t going out with them, but this night felt potentially huge for him.

He’d sent Cora a message asking politely for the true identity of her gaming partner, or at least their gamer tag, and she’d replied “Chill bro he’ll tell you tonight.” Now this could mean _anything_ , so Stiles was prepared for anything. Prepared being he’d consumed alcohol and food and he was eagerly anticipating any kind of notification alerting him to First Contact.

Though, the music was kind of loud. And he hadn’t checked his phone in a while. Where was it, anyways?

It was under the table, glow just fading from a _third_ notification. Suddenly preparedness became panic and multiple curse words as Stiles threw himself across the room.

“ _Hey”_

_“U online?”_

_“Nvm it’s cool”_

Stiles nearly stabbed himself in the eye in his haste to reply and save his life.

“ _I’m online! 2 sex”_

And then, _“Sry. Drunk. 2 secs”_

Resisting the urge to slam his face through his monitor, Stiles woke up his Xbox.

 _“So who are u?”_ Stiles got straight to the point.

Whoever he is, he can’t type for shit, Stiles thought, as the minutes ticked by.

_“Cora’s brother.”_

Stiles flew to Facebook. One brother listed - Derek. It shouldn’t have been surprising that he was just as hot as Cora, but Stiles started sweating vodka anyways.

I’m too drunk for this, Stiles thought as he mangled the controller.

_“Nice. Ur first time playing?”_

Empires rose and fell in the time it took Derek Hale to reply.

_“Yeah. I was bored. She’s making me do more tonight while she’s out. Help me.”_

Stiles grinned, and crackled his knuckles.

 

* * *

 

 

Derek spent the evening embarking on various co-op quests with the Slinky, who conveniently forgot to give his own name while Derek the fool gave up his own. According to Cora the quests weren’t vital to completing the game, but they would be good practice for him - whatever that was supposed to mean.

_“U suck”_

Derek rolled his eyes. This guy thought he was hilarious, sending the same message every time Derek got himself or his team blown to hell.

 _“I thought you were supposed to be helping me.”_ Derek had coaxed Slinky’s number out of him after mission number two, when it became apparent that exiting to the inbox in the main menu would absolutely cause Derek to quit the game, every time.

Or so he thinks, thought Derek smugly, who could now navigate the entire console interface with ease.

Their conversation wasn’t exactly flirting, but after Derek quit the game for the night they texted through a dinner of pizza and three episodes of _Law and Order: SVU_. Slinky slowly began to sober up, and Derek actually enjoyed his company once he got out of the habit and saying _“Haha and then what :)”_ as a reply to nearly everything Derek said.

“ _Are you still gonna help Cora out with the game?”_ he sent, as Derek was brushing his teeth.

 _“I don’t think I have a choice,”_ Derek texted back, one-handed. “ _She said she has plans.”_

“ _Are you afraid?”_

_“Absolutely.”_

_“I’ll help you.”_

_“I’ll hold you to that”_

_“You’d better hold me to something anyways.”_

Derek’s toothbrush fell out of his mouth and into the sink with a clatter. Wiping blobs of minty foam off his screen, he struggled to text back anything coherent and suave as the blush rose all the way to his ears.

The next day, Cora sent him a screenshot of the twelve dragon eggs and six live chickens that had been gifted into her in-game inbox. Derek covered his eyes and struggled not to grin outrageously.

 

* * *

 

 

‘So he _still_ doesn’t know who you are?’ Lydia asked from her position at the end of Scott’s bed.

Stiles flipped his highlighter into the air and caught it. ‘Nope,’ he replied, popping the cap off and highlighting sentences in his notes at random.

‘But you know who he is?’

‘Of course,’ Stiles said, like it was obvious. Scott, lying on the floor eating a burrito, was only half listening, as he was mostly preoccupied with trying to watch a YouTube tutorial on removing pink hair dye from sensitive areas without having to shave.

‘That doesn’t seem fair,’ Liam piped up, all the way from the bathroom that he was too afraid to stray far from. ‘It’s like you’re catfishing the dude.’

‘Careful Liam,’ warned Stiles. ‘You open your mouth so much, you might …’ Stiles proceeded to make horrific gagging and retching noises that had Liam groaning and kicking the door shut.

‘And they say we haze them too early,’ sighed Stiles.

Scott threw his phone down. ‘Ok, this is getting me nowhere,’ he said finally. ‘I need an iced beverage, like, immediately.’

‘Allison’s finished work at three,’ Lydia said, sitting up.

Stiles punched the air. ‘Discounts!’ he cheered.

So Stiles, Lydia, Scott, and a hangdog Liam made their way to the smoothie bar on campus, where an extremely pale Allison was cleaning the blender behind the counter.

‘Man,’ commented Stiles, as they grabbed seats at the bar. ‘Allison. Those orange and mango chunks sure do look like - ’

‘I’ll kick you out,’ warned Allison immediately, looking dangerously close to a meltdown. ‘I got here at nine thirty, took one look at the oranges Katie was slicing, and threw up out back.’ She shook her head as Lydia took her hand over the counter. ‘I called Isaac to come in and let me go early, but he’s a no-show so far.’

Lydia wrinkled her nose. ‘Where did he even end up? I can’t remember seeing him after we did those …’

‘Those jagerbombs, yeah,’ Scott finished, remembering. ‘Aw man, I was totally blaming him for the pink - err, situation.’ Scott immediately looked shifty, but Stiles liked him just enough to not bring up Scott’s hot pink pubs (again, and in public).

There was a thud as Liam set his head on the bar and promptly went to sleep.

While the others dithered over their smoothie ingredients and Allison tried not to barf, Stiles scanned the other patrons. The back of his neck was tingling, and he thought it was just _too_ good to be true, but he looked anyways …

‘Oh my god,’ he whispered, as the full force of his hangover caught up to him. ‘Not now.’

‘What?’ Scott looked up.

‘Hmm?’ mumbled Liam.

‘Wait, what are you guys talking about?’ Allison asked, blinking tiredly.

Lydia was unfortunately the only one who got it.

‘This is just what I needed,’ she smiled, crossing her legs and playing with the straw of her smoothie. ‘This, Allison, is what happens when you catfish.’

‘Stop saying that!’ Stiles hissed, flapping at them all, watching with heightening panic as Derek Hale approached the smoothie bar.

Liam yawned, head folded on his arms. ‘What’re you even worried about,’ he said. ‘He doesn’t even know who you are.’

Stiles bit his lip, eyes trained on the back wall. ‘It is _so_ not him that I’m worried about.’

Scott and Lydia were practically vibrating either side of him. Derek was glancing at a menu not three feet from Liam. If he happened to even glance their way, he’d see Lydia and Scott grinning at him like fools, and Stiles blushing to his hair roots. He could probably _smell_ the vodka on Stiles’ skin.

Allison, still half dazed, wandered over to Derek to take his order.

‘I bet he orders loads of protein,’ Scott muttered.

‘I will unfriend you from life if you even glance at him,’ whispered Stiles out of the corner of his mouth, before choking down half his smoothie.

‘Two scoops of vanilla protein,’ repeated Allison, making a note.

Lydia snickered and Scott crowed softly. Stiles wanted to ask Scott if he was planning on using Nair or Veet on Little Scott, only it would require using his voice, which at that moment was a bit of an ask.

Isaac chose that moment to stagger into the bar, looking far better than he had any right to. Allison saw him and practically tore off her apron, pressing the order into his hand.

Isaac squinted at the paper as he tied his own apron with one hand. ‘Allison, wait,’ he called after her. ‘I can’t read this part…’

‘Just go up and talk to him,’ encouraged Scott, as Allison leaned over the bar to confer. ‘You are planning on having some sort of sex with him, right?’

Stiles glared furiously at him. ‘Please, speak louder. And yes, I am, but this is _so_ not the time for this conversation.’

‘Why not?’

Stiles risked another glance in Derek’s direction. He was wearing a red BH University t-shirt - devastatingly tight in all of the best places - and basketball shorts, glasses, and carrying a gym bag. Stiles knew that outfit well; not that he’d ever been to the gym in his life, but so many of his past hook-ups had used the gym to sweat out a hangover that Stiles had learned that it was not the outfit they wanted to bump into Stiles wearing.

Or maybe they just hadn’t wanted to bump into Stiles again. Either way, this conversation was not happening right now.

‘Derek Hale?’ Isaac was still reading the order, loudly. Stiles raised his head, panic on his face, but he was too late. ‘Hey, isn’t that the guy who has the sister - ’

And that’s the story of how Liam’s hazing ended; in the puddle of puke he produced, with truly spectacular timing, all over the floor. Stiles and the others had to scramble to get out of the way, and in the ensuing chaos, Stiles saw a pair of basketball shorts beating a swift retreat from the smoothie bar.

 

‘I cannot believe,’ Stiles said later, ‘how perfectly you timed that. Like, dude, were you holding it in and just waiting for the right moment? Or - no, tell me honestly - was it Isaac’s voice?’

Liam dropped his head into his hands as the others laughed, scattered around some of the cracked plastic couches on the concourse. Scott and Stiles had dragged Liam into a bathroom on campus and cleaned him up as best they could, but a call to Mason yielded a stubborn refusal to accept Liam back into their dorm room.

‘He puked on my shoes last night, and I’m having someone over later,’ Mason had insisted over the phone. ‘I love Liam, but I am not trying to put the moves on someone while the smell of tequila-puke is lingering.’

No one disagreed, and Liam was strategically placed on a couch with a clear view of the bathroom.

‘Honestly, I knew it was gonna happen,’ Liam confessed. Scott rubbed his shoulder but withdrew quickly, just in case. ‘It was just a case of when.’

‘Must have been the sexual tension radiating from Stiles’ body,’ grinned Allison, who was now fully recovered and lounging next to Lydia with a cookie and the cure, keeping it well away from Liam in case the smell of the beer sent him over the edge again.

‘I thought we’d moved past me, ok?’ said Stiles testily. ‘We’re ragging on Liam now. Vomit guy, remember?’

There was a brief pause.

‘Naahhhh,’ drawled Scott, as the others all shook their heads. ‘Still you, buddy.’

And this time, even the threat of pink pubes couldn’t save Stiles.

Walking home later that night, Stiles was reflecting that he really _should_ have said something to Derek, even if it wasn’t the right time. It’ll be weird no matter when I do it, he thought. And the sooner we meet in person the sooner we _meet_ in _person_.

And as though his filthy thoughts had summoned him, Stiles spotted Derek arriving back at the building just up the hill from Stiles’.

This was his second chance. There was no vomit, no annoying friends, no lingering hangover (or not much of one, anyway).

Stiles paused and took a breath so he could do a thorough evaluation. Sweaty palms: check. Last night’s clothes: check. Hangover hair: definitely absolutely check. All the hallmarks of a disaster.

Stiles pushed his hair back with a nervous hand. Fuck it, he thought, at least I’ll be a realistic average.

 

* * *

 

 

Derek was exhausted.

He had to journey all the way across campus to get his protein smoothie after some weak fresher puked all over the smoothie bar off the concourse and ruined everybody’s afternoon. His friends had hauled him off with much laughter and hollering, but it didn’t look like they’d been kicked out or even made to clean it up. Probably because they knew the staff. Typical.

After that it had been gym and study for the whole day, and now it was eight o’ clock and Derek couldn’t find his damn key fob. Unless that was it, just at the tip of his fingers, buried at the very bottom of his bag.

‘Uh, hi.’

Derek’s head jerked up, and his newly discovered key flew out of his hand and across the path into the grass.

The pale kid standing beside him looked stunned. ‘I did not expect that.’

Temper flaring, Derek stomped across the road and scanned the grass. Nothing.

‘Dude, I’ll help.’ The kid was scrambling across the path. Derek glared at him silently as he too began to squint at the grass. He was tall with messy brown hair and an alarming amount of layered plaid. He might have been pretty cute, but Derek was too annoyed to see it.

‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘That was totally my bad for sneaking up on you.’

‘Well you can make it up to me by finding it,’ said Derek tightly. They flicked on the flashlights on their phones and swept them over the grass.

‘Can’t be that hard to find,’ the guy reasoned. ‘What colour is your key fob?’

Derek resisted the urge to roll his eyes. ‘Green.’

The guy glanced over at him. ‘Oh.’

Derek’s eyes returned to the grass. ‘Why do you ask?’

The guy paused, before rummaging in his pocket. ‘Because mine’s purple,’ he said, dangling the key in front of Derek. It occurred to him that other buildings on campus must have different coloured fobs. He’d been here two and a half years and didn’t know that?

‘You didn’t know that?’

None of this was improving Derek’s mood. He wanted to get indoors and text the Slinky. He really regretted not finding out his name last night. Derek had avoided texting him all day, so as not to come off as too eager, but his phone had been burning a hole in his pocket and he figured he’d left it an acceptable amount of time, so if he could just _get inside_ and get this dude to _fuck off_ -

‘Found it!’

The guy straightened up, a big smile on his face, dangling Derek’s key from one hand. He tossed it to Derek, who wasn’t ready and nearly missed it.

‘Piece of cake,’ the guy smiled, and it was a nice smile too. Derek half-smiled back before remembering that it was his fault to begin with, and all of this was delaying him from who he really wanted to talk to.

‘Thanks,’ Derek said shortly. ‘Uh, did you want something, before…’

‘Before I scared the crap out of you and made you lose your key?’ The guy grinned again. ‘Yeah, I did actually. I’m - ’

And then it dawned on Derek. ‘You’re the guy from the smoothie bar, aren’t you? Your friend was the one who - ’

‘Puked his ring up and ruined everybody’s day, yeah,’ the guy agreed, looking gloomy at the reminder. ‘That was us alright. Hazing freshmen, what can I say. It gets out of hand. Sorry you couldn’t get your protein fix, buddy.’

Derek squinted at him suspiciously. He’d wonder if the guy was being insincere if he didn’t look so genuinely down about the situation.

‘It’s ok,’ he said slowly. ‘I got it elsewhere.’

The guy nodded. There was an extended silence between them that grew steadily more uncomfortable until Derek finally said, ‘Well, I’m going now. Thanks for apologising, I guess.’

The guy looked at him, and there was something bitter about his expression.

‘You in a hurry?’ he asked rather sourly. Derek frowned at this random pouting stranger who’d help lose and then find his key and wondered whether he was having as bad a day as Derek was.

‘I guess, sort of,’ he replied. ‘Uh, have a good night man.’

It was a weird encounter. He was hot too, Derek thought. But Derek had shit to do.

Unfortunately, Kira had other plans.

He hammered on the door for two minutes straight until she finally peeked around it, bare-shouldered with messy hair.

‘Again?’ he demanded.

Kira looked particularly urgent this time. ‘We had a fight,’ she stage-whispered. ‘And it was totally my fault. Please just give me tonight?’

Derek resisted the urge to roll his eyes. ‘Am I ever going to meet him? I’d feel a lot better if he could buy me a beer.’

Kira’s lips twitched. ‘You will,’ she said. ‘After tonight. This is absolutely the last time this happens.’

There was no arguing with her when she was naked. Derek couldn’t exactly turf them out.

‘The scales are now tipped in my favour,’ he warned. ‘You owe me one Chipotle, one Arizona, and at least two socks on the door, with no interest. Ok?’

Kira gave him a very enthusiastic two thumbs up before literally slamming the door in his face.

Derek automatically began walking in the direction of Cora’s room, two floors up, but caught himself halfway through. It wasn’t the only place he could go …

 _Hey,_ he texted. _Totally got sexiled again. Can I come over for a while? We could  play some co-op. No pressure._

That was a totally reasonable request at this stage? Derek was fairly certain the Slinky was into him, or at least liked him somewhat. Friends hung out in each others room. It didn’t have to be anything serious.

His reply was not encouraging.

_Not tonight._

Derek stared blankly at his phone, pausing mid-step. Wait, what?

Another text.

 _I’ll be online tho_.

Slightly more encouraging. Derek hurried along to Cora’s room, prepared to offer her large amounts of cash, food, and/or his life’s blood in return for her Xbox _._

‘I need your Xbox, it’s life or death,’ he stated when Cora finally let him in (she was using the lock now).

She frowned at him sleepily. ‘Sure, whatever,’ she said, stepping aside. ‘Where’s the fire?’

‘I have no idea,’ Derek muttered.

 

* * *

 

 

Stiles was known for being a bit passive aggressive when he was upset. Just a bit.

‘Dude, I love you, but I’m so glad Malia’s your roommate and not me,’ Scott said bluntly, not looking directly at the camera as he tried to finish his homework. ‘You can get scary.’

‘Lack of sex will do that to a guy,’ Stiles said mildly, feet on his desk beside Scott’s face on the screen, staring at his monitor and waiting for Derek to come online. ‘I’m not even that mad.’

Scott snorted, eyes flickering to Stiles. ‘Yeah, right. I know that look. When Jackson stole your crayons in kindergarten you had exactly that look.’

Stiles shrugged. ‘Hey, sometimes sand gets into a guy’s sandwich. It happens.’

‘And again at the start of junior high party, when he pushed you into Lydia’s pool. Same look.’

‘His eyebrows grew back, didn’t they?’

Scott was laughing, but he was shaking his head. ‘All I’m saying is you have a tendency to brush things off like they’re fine, but then secretly go explode somewhere else.’

A notification appeared on the monitor. Derek Hale was online.

‘Trust me,’ Stiles said. ‘I won’t be the one exploding.’

 

* * *

 

 

Derek knew he wasn’t actually great at video games, but he had no idea he could be this inexplicably bad.

‘Cora, I’ve died like five hundred times,’ he grumbled, when she appeared to check on his progress. ‘What gives?’

Cora leaned over his shoulder and watched him play. The Slinky had been mostly silent so far, despite being on his team and having every excuse to communicate with Derek in some way.

Once again, Derek hardly took two steps and he was dead. He huffed out an exasperated sigh as Cora sniggered.

‘What?’ he asked.

‘Nothing,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘Go again.’

This time Derek got closer to his objective. The other players online paid him little attention, preferring to stick to their own tasks. Derek was enjoying the game despite promising himself he wouldn’t get addicted, and there was definitely something to this whole achievement business. It was a sense of accomplishment that he just wasn’t getting with college.

‘I’ve been trying to get this one for ages,’ he muttered as he closed in on his target. ‘Almost - oh COME ON.’

He threw the controller down, but Cora pointed at the bottom of the screen.

‘There, see that?’

Derek squinted. The message was small and brief but it definitely said “ **Friendly Fire” _._**

And just then he noticed that the Slinky had been kicked from the game.

‘Ok, what’s going on?’ Derek frowned, as he rejoined the game.

Cora was grinning horribly at him.

‘Oh, you pissed him off,’ she said. ‘He’s totally sabotaging you, dude. That’s why the game kicked him.’

Derek was outraged. He tried to find him on the map, and sure enough there was his dot, tailing Derek. He turned around, and immediately ate a bullet.

‘Ouch,’ winched Cora. ‘Right in the face. Man, what did you do to the Slinky?’

Derek tossed his controller down again. ‘That’s a stupid name,’ he muttered, giving up. ‘I’m not calling him that anymore.’

 

* * *

 

 

‘Was that really worth it?’ asked Scott.

Stiles set down his controller as Derek logged off.

‘Well, it made me feel better,’ he lied.

 

* * *

 

 

Despite his looming exams and the stone cold silence on the other end of his phone, Derek still found time to play video games. Cora introduced him to Steam and PC gaming, and Derek discovered that taking out your frustrations virtually could be just as rewarding as a punching bag, if more of a strain on his eyesight.

It was also nice to see the Slinky (it was still a stupid name, but it stuck) on the leaderboards sometimes. Even if they weren’t texting anymore, Derek could keep track of his progress and see what games he was playing. He had an eclectic taste, which Derek liked to follow, just to experience what he was and maybe get inside his head a little.

The Slinky liked horror games mostly, and also played a lot of hectic, brightly coloured platformers and dungeon-crawlers. He blasted through almost all of the achievements for _The Binding of Isaac_ in one night and Derek followed suit, getting lost in the repetitive nature of the game before remembering he’d started it just to get inside a guy’s head, a guy who apparently was done talking to him.

It would be a lot more fun, Derek thought, as he attempted the acid trip that was _Cloudberry Kingdom_ , if we could play these together.

 

* * *

 

 

_You online?_

Stiles glared at his phone for five straight minutes until the reply came through.

_You gonna start that friendly fire bullshit again?_

_…No_

_Ok. Give me 10_.

‘There,’ said Malia, standing over him with her arms folded. ‘Was that so hard?’

Stiles threw down his phone. ’No,’ he said sulkily. ‘Ok, your turn. Where the hell have you been? I feel like you’ve been avoiding me.’

This was the first time in a while that Malia had been in their room for any length of time. Between classes and the gym and whoever she was fucking, Stiles had been lucky to catch a glimpse of her as she ran around corners.

Now, sitting with her feet up on the coffee table, a beer in her hand and hickies on her neck, she looked more relaxed than Stiles could remember seeing her in a while.

‘I haven’t been avoiding you,’ she assured him, smiling. ‘Any of you. It’s just this girl, man … I dunno. I’m kinda in love, I guess.’

Stiles wrinkled up his face. ‘You? Seriously?’

Malia raised her eyebrows. ‘Um, what’s that supposed to mean? Is this the Malia has no feelings thing again? Not everyone cries at _Bambi_ , Stiles, can we please move on from that?’

Stiles sat back, cracking open his own beer.

‘You have ten minutes,’ he said taking a drink. ‘Tell me everything.’

 

* * *

 

 

Derek had to admit, they played pretty well together. They were ruthless as a co-op team in _GTA V,_ a game Derek didn’t really love, but the Slinky assured him its just because his level was “piss poor, even for you”.

‘Thanks, insults to my gaming skills are exactly what I look for in a co-op partner,’ Derek grumbled into the mic.

The Slinky’s voice came back muffled, but oddly familiar. ‘It’s called banter, man. Loosen up.’

‘How about I run you over, that’ll loosen me up.’

‘Yeah, the day you sabotage shit is the day I - hey man don’t run me over!’

‘Oops,’ Derek said, as he flattened him with a firetruck.

There was no sulking this time though. They stopped fucking around and did a few jobs, finding that they communicated very well without even talking to each other.

‘Ok, I’ll get the cargobob, you get the - ’

‘I’m already in the air,’ Derek said, concentrating very hard on not hitting buildings. Flying was not his strong point. ‘I’ll pick you up.’

‘Um. Two seconds.’

Derek hovered over the edge of their target area patiently.

‘Well?’

‘Uh, I’ll meet you there.’ His dot was rapidly moving away from Derek.

‘You got a wanted level, didn’t you.’

‘I - I did, yes.’

Derek was laughing, despite the mission being doomed. ‘What the hell did you do?’

‘Listen, the important thing is that it was not my fault - oh fuck there are so many cops - aw shit.’

Derek rolled his eyes as the FAILED screen appeared. ‘Nice one.’

‘You got time for another go?’

Derek glanced around. There wasn’t a peep out of Cora, which was reasonable since it was one in the morning. He had class the next day at ten. Derek was actually mildly concerned at how much he didn’t care that he’d be likely too tired to concentrate.

‘Sure, one more go.’

As they loaded up, he asked, ‘So, does your sister mind you using her Xbox so much?’

‘Not really,’ Derek answered. ‘She’ll probably spend the next two years calling in favours for it, though.’

‘Like your roommate, huh?’

Derek snorted. ‘Nah, we’re definitely even now. No more socks on the door unless they’re mine.’

There was a brief, loaded pause.

‘Much of that happening?’

Derek was so glad the Slinky couldn’t see his face.

‘Uh, not right now,’ he admitted.

‘So there’s no one you’re … like, with?’

Derek rolled his eyes. ‘Do you think I’d be spending this much time online with you if there was?’

There was another pause, ten times worse than the first.

‘Uh, so - ’

‘Oh look the game’s starting,’ Derek said, mashing the keys and almost immediately killing himself.

 

* * *

 

 

Stiles was interrupted on his way to class by something on the notices board. God bless the digital age, but there was still something nice about an old-fashioned flier.

‘You gonna enter?’ Malia asked over his shoulder.

 _Gaming Tournament_ , the flier read. _Two team co-op. Games TBA. Sign up below_.

‘Fuck yeah,’ Stiles said, immediately thinking of Derek as he scribbled his name almost illegibly. Some of the names already had partners added beside them.

‘You gonna ask Derek?’

Stiles shrugged. ‘Maybe.’

Malia pointed to the signature three above Stiles’s. ‘There’s his sister.’

Stiles squinted. ‘I can see that.’

Malia dragged her finger over. ‘And she’s already entered a partner.’

Stiles’s heart sank.

‘Goddammit,’ he muttered. ‘Of course she would.’ And of course Derek would say yes to his sister before asking Stiles first. Or did that mean he just didn’t want to meet in person yet? Or at all?

‘Maybe you can ask Danny,’ Malia suggested, slyly. ‘It would be a good way for you guys to bond - again.’

Stiles felt the urge to throttle something.

 

* * *

 

 

‘I signed up for that gaming tournament,’ Cora told him over lunch.

‘Mmhmm,’ Derek replied, not really listening. He was looking over at a group of rowdy students. The one in the red hoody sure could make a lot of noise.

‘Signed you up too,’ Cora added.

‘Cool,’ Derek said.

‘As my partner.’

‘Ok - wait, hang on.’ Derek snapped out of it. ‘You signed me up for what now?’

Cora sipped her milkshake. ‘To be my partner in the gaming tournament. I was late signing up because I was hungover, and everyone I know has already partnered with someone. You’re halfway decent, it’ll be fine.’

Derek scratched his head, feeling annoyed.

‘You know, I might have wanted to ask someone else,’ he said.

Cora gave him a very dangerous look.

‘You might have, but you wouldn’t have dared leave me without a partner considering how many favours I’ve been doling out lately,’ she said, looking scarily like their mother.

‘You sound like mom,’ he told her, miffed.

Cora shrugged. ‘It’s a good look,’ she said, crossing her legs and polishing off her milkshake noisily. Derek sighed and looked back over to where the red hoody guy had been causing shenanigans. He was now in the process of getting shoved to the ground by a tall, curly-haired guy who Derek was sure worked at the smoothie bar. His friends were laughing and doing nothing about it.

It came back to Derek now - it was the guy who scared the key out of Derek’s hand. The same guy from the puking incident. Campus sure was small.

Derek laughed softly as he watched him eat the dirt, but felt a strange urge to protective the little guy, who really wasn’t that little. He was probably taller than Derek. Still, there was something soft and appealing about him that made Derek curious.

‘Fine, I’ll do it,’ he said, thinking guiltily about a certain other gamer who might also be looking for a partner.

Cora looked at Derek, her expression softening just a touch.

‘Look, I’m sure he’ll be competing too,’ she said. ‘Maybe it’ll be just the right about of sexual tension you guys need to finally seal the - ‘

‘Cora, please,’ Derek said, breathing heavily through his nose.

Cora laughed softly. ‘You’re such a baby. He’s gonna eat you alive.’

When Derek looked back over for the red hoody, he and his friends were gone.

 

* * *

 

 

The first game announced was _Smite_ , and was clearly a way to eliminate multiple teams at once, since apparently every half-assed gamer with a laptop on campus had signed up for the tournament.

‘Lazy PC gamers,’ Stiles goaded Scott and Lydia, who were lounging on the couch and only half paying attention.

‘Says you,’ Danny grinned from beside him, which was pure lies. Stiles was more than a little tense, and it was only half because his ex was his teammate.

‘Shut up,’ Stiles said, trying to be easy. ‘Malia, are you ready yet or what?’

Malia was supposed to be Scott’s teammate, but she’d been on the phone for the last thirty minutes and counting.

‘Just a sec!’ she called. ‘Uh, start without me!’

‘That kind of defeats the whole purpose of a team,’ Scott complained, but Lydia came to the rescue, picking up Malia’s laptop and looking determined. Scott raised his eyebrows at Stiles, who only grinned.

‘Alright Lydia, your call,’ he said, spinning around in his chair. ‘My money’s on you guys crashing out in the first round.’

‘I really wouldn’t take that bet,’ Allison said quietly, a small smile on her face from her position at Lydia’s feet.

The first few rounds were made up of multiple teams, thus eliminating whole groups at a time. Cora and Derek, were on the opposing team, Stiles noticed. Not that he cared.

His phone buzzed.

_Good luck. You’ll need it._

‘You gonna get that?’ Danny asked, glancing over at him.

Stiles met his eyes briefly before looking away. ‘Nah,’ he said. ‘Just trash talk.’

 _Smite_ was total chaos at the best of times, but all of Stiles’ attention was suddenly focused on staving off the combined attacks of the Hales, who were utterly fucking ruthless.

‘Uh, Stiles, you need some help?’ Danny asked about ten minutes in. ‘Or CPR?’

Stiles hadn’t felt so under pressure since he was hungover in his psych exam. They were _hounding_ him.

‘That friendly fire doesn’t seem so friendly now, huh Stiles?’ Scott called, who was doing surprisingly well so far.

‘What?’ laughed Danny.

‘It’s nothing, don’t worry about it,’ Stiles said. ‘Some people can clearly hold a grudge for a very long time.’

‘Stiles it was like two weeks ago - ’

‘A very long time, Scott!’ Stiles said, sounding rather more shrill than he’d have liked.

‘This game is fun,’ said Lydia, obliterating two players at once.

‘That’s my girl,’ said Allison calmly, patting her knee.

Stiles and Danny emerged from the first round. So did the Hales of course, and to everyone’s surprise, Lydia and Scott.

‘She covered my ass the whole time,’ said Scott, looking like he’d just had a religious experience. ‘It was unbelievable.’

Lydia shrugged. ‘It’s kinda like math. It makes sense to me.’

Allison winked at Stiles. ‘Told you.’

Isaac and Liam were both eliminated. Stiles felt justified in calling them to laugh at this until they hung up on him.

‘Ok, I’m ready,’ Malia said, breezing in. ‘Hey, is the game over?’

‘Round two,’ said Stiles through a mouthful of Doritos, preparing to spend the next twenty minutes being literally assaulted.

‘Here Malia, you can play for me,’ Scott offered, standing up.

Malia frowned. ‘Instead of Lydia?’

Scott raised his eyebrows. ‘Trust me. It’s the smart choice.’

Stiles wiped his hands on his trousers. ‘Dukes up, Tate. Some of these gamers are nasty.’

‘Yeah, you had two on your ass the whole time, Stiles,’ Danny said, frowning. ‘Someone you know?’

Stiles could _feel_ Malia’s eyes on him. ‘Uh, sort of.’

‘He wishes.’

‘Malia the game’s starting,’ Stiles said through gritted teeth. Danny threw him another weird look, but was immediately distracted by multiple attacks from … oh no.

‘What the fuck is this,’ Danny muttered, fighting back frantically. Stiles threw an anxious glance at Malia, who was torn between amusement at Stiles and sheer awe at the carnage Lydia was creating. ‘Why the hell am I getting roasted by these two?’

‘No clue,’ Stiles said guiltily.

 

* * *

 

 

‘Why are we attacking this guy now?’ Derek asked.

‘I have my reasons,’ Cora replied, who was suddenly an utter savage at _Smite_. Derek was concerned, but followed her lead.

 

* * *

 

 

Twenty minutes later Danny threw down his controller. ‘I need a break from those two assholes,’ he snapped, storming off. Stiles rubbed his eyes and tried to imagine what on earth the Hales were up to. Were they trying to annoy his partner to death, or just force them both to drop out?

‘Dude, your boy is mean,’ Scott whispered, sitting down in Danny’s vacated seat. Malia and Lydia were cracking open celebratory beers, having topped the leaderboard this time. It turned out that Malia only needed about ten minutes to learn the game before becoming totally proficient. The third round teams were being organised now, and they had about a ten minute break before the final group stage.

‘I don’t get what’s up with him,’ Stiles said. ‘He’s usually all about fair play and shit.’

Scott’s expression was troubled, bless him. ‘You think it’s his sister?’

Stiles ran a hand over his face. ‘Maybe, but why? Like, what did I do to piss her off? And why is he going along with it?’

‘I think I know,’ Malia offered, and Stiles suppressed a groan. Did he want to know? He shared a worried glance with Scott. They only had about eight minutes left. How much could she possibly psychoanalyse in eight minutes?

‘I was on the phone with Kira before we started,’ Malia explained. Her hair was tied back in a messy knot and her sleeves were rolled up, all business-like. Beside her, Lydia and Allison were suddenly paying a lot of attention.

‘Wait, Kira who?’ Stiles asked. ‘Your Kira?’

‘Yes, my Kira,’ Malia said patiently. ‘The girl I literally haven’t shut up about for like the last month.’

‘She’s also Derek Hale’s roommate,’ Lydia added softly.

Stiles almost fell off his chair. ‘Derek’s - she’s _what_? Excuse me?’

‘I thought you knew,’ Lydia shrugged. ‘That’s who’s been sexiling him.’

Stiles glared at Malia. ‘You couldn’t have told me any of this?’

Malia shrugged. ‘Hey, I only found out before the last round. I don’t know how Lydia knows any of this.’

All eyes turned to Lydia, who shrugged again.

‘Hey, I know stuff,’ she said. When everyone kept staring, she sighed exasperatedly. ‘Oh come on. We all know Malia’s been sleeping with a Kira. A quick Facebook search can tell you that Derek’s roommates with a Kira, because they leave each other wall posts about buying milk and coffee. Both Kira’s are Japanese, and it’s not exactly a common name.’

‘Right,’ said Malia. ‘And I told Kira I was doing this stupid game tournament thing - ’

‘Ok, don’t pretend you don’t love it,’ interjected Stiles, who was able to be cantankerous about something unrelated even in the midst of a personal crisis.

‘Whatever,’ said Malia. ‘And I told her - well, I told her who I was playing with.’

Stiles frowned. ‘And?’

‘I told her I was on a team with Scott, and Scott’s best friend Stiles was on a team with Danny.’

‘Who’s in Cora’s English class,’ Scott pointed out.

‘Ok, since when did you become a social observer?’ Stiles asked, feeling decidedly wrong-footed. He clearly wasn’t seeing the connection that they all apparently were, judging by the looks they were giving him.

‘What’s the big deal?’ he asked, looking from Scott to Malia to Lydia. Allison was typing away on her laptop.

‘Well, Kira was with Cora when I called her,’ Malia said. ‘They’re friends.’

‘They’re both in my Economics class,’ Lydia added.

‘How do you keep track of all these people’s schedules? And _so?_ I’ve never once told Derek my name - ’

‘Stiles, you continue to underestimate Cora Hale,’ Lydia said.

‘Your relationship status life event with Danny is only like four posts down on your Facebook page, because you never post anything,’ Allison chimed in, spinning her laptop around. ‘If she’s figured out who you are - and, honestly, a fucking monkey would have figured it out by now - then she would have searched you on Facebook, and - ‘

‘And she’d know I’m teammates with my ex,’ Stiles finished, suddenly not feeling so great. ‘Fuck. This is starting to make horrible sense.’

Danny chose that moment to walk back into the room, smelling of alcohol and bloodlust. ‘Ok, I’m ready. Lets get these filthy casuals.’

 

* * *

 

 

‘Cora, I think we went too hard on him that time,’ Derek said worriedly as the game ended. They’d qualified for the next round, but only just, mainly because Cora had insisted they focus their attacks on JustD93 instead of actually trying to score points or defend themselves. ‘Seriously, what was your issue?’

Cora stood up and stretched. ‘I’m getting a Gatorade, want one?’

Derek pushed his chair away from his laptop. ‘Cora.’

She stuck her head into the fridge. ‘Shoot, I’ve only got Mountain Dew.’

Derek stood up. ‘Cora.’

‘It’ll do, I guess,’ she said, emerging with her drink. ‘Heh, get it, _dew_.’

Derek whipped it out of her hand and closed the fridge. ‘Cora Hale, I’ll quit right now if you don’t tell me who we just systematically massacred.’

Cora made a face, but held her hand out for her drink. ‘Fine. It was Danny Mahealani.’

Derek let her take the drink as he processed that. ‘Who’s she? Someone who never called you back?’

Cora snorted. ‘He’s a guy, Derek.’

Derek was even more confused. ‘Is it someone who never called _me_ back?’

Cora shook her head. ‘It’s not about you. Or, well, it is, but it’s more about who he’s partnered with.’

She had clearly decided that she wanted to be cryptic. Grumbling, Derek crossed to his computer and pulled up the leaderboard where the teams were listed.

‘Cora, is this about the Slinky?’ Derek asked. God, he hated that name. ‘You’re attacking his teammate? Not cool, Cora.’

‘His ex-boyfriend,’ Cora pointed out, sipping delicately from her Mountain Dew.

Derek paused.

‘Wait, how do you know that? We don’t even know his name.’

‘I do.’

Derek spluttered. ‘Mind sharing?’

‘I do actually,’ said Cora. ‘If he wanted you to know he would have told you.’

Derek was feeling very conflicted. ‘Well that’s … that’s still out of line,’ he said. ‘It’s not fair play.’

Cora shrugged. ‘Fine, you want to stop? Play fair? We can do that.’

Derek had to sit and have a think. Was he the type of person who was petty enough to try to run off someone’s ex-boyfriend team member in an online gaming tournament just because he was jealous?

 

* * *

 

 

‘I can’t believe these jerks are coming at me again,’ fumed Danny. ‘Stiles, who the fuck are they?’

‘What makes you think I know?’ protested Stiles, feeling like a horrible dirty rotten lying liar who lies.

‘Because they came after _you_ first,’ Danny snapped, practically abandoning the game so he could glare at Stiles. ‘I knew you’d find a way to make me regret this, Stiles.’

Stiles shrank in his seat. ‘Ok fine, maybe I do know them,’ he muttered.

Danny sighed, exasperated. ‘And I suppose you’re fucking one of them. No, come on,’ he said, raising his voice over Stiles’ protests and the noise of the game. ‘This is fucking typical, Stiles. There’s always something with you.’

‘That’s not fair,’ Stiles complained. ‘I had no idea he was like this, and I definitely didn’t tell him you were my teammate.’

Danny shook his head. ‘Whatever, man,’ he said. ‘I’m out.’

And he just stood up and walked away.

Stiles sat there staring after him, wondering what the hell he was going to do now.

‘Danny - ’

‘Don’t worry buddy, I got you,’ said Scott, sliding into Danny’s seat and covering both of them while Stiles remained shellshocked and slowly filling with fury.

‘No one sabotages me,’ he growled, turning back to his laptop. ‘Scott, Lydia, Malia - new plan.’

 

* * *

 

 

Cora blinked. ‘Uh, I think we pissed him off.’

‘You think?’ Derek snapped, as the game exploded around them.

 

* * *

 

 

After the destruction of the final round, Stiles and the others all went out for drinks.

‘You need to cool off,’ Scott said, guiding Stiles through town. Stiles felt like there was still steam coming out of his ears despite nearly wiping the Hales off the board. Nearly.

‘They qualified,’ he growled.

‘Just means they survived to be demolished by you another day,’ said Malia, who was feeling pretty bad about her part in everything. She’d already bought them a sixer for the walk, and Stiles was drinking two at a time.

Stiles groaned and threw his head back miserably. ‘I want to ruin his life but I also _don’t_ , you know?’

‘I get you, bro,’ Scott said sympathetically, squeezing his shoulder with one hand and drinking his beer with the other.

‘Hey,’ said Lydia, pointing. ‘Look who it is.’

Two very attractive dark haired people were crossing the street ahead of them. Before Stiles could launch an attack, Scott and Malia were steering him back into the nearest bar.

‘I’m gonna say something anyways,’ Stiles protested.

‘I know you are,’ Scott said. ‘I just think it’ll be easier if you’re drunk, so you can blame it on the alcohol.’

‘Blame it on the goose,’ murmured Stiles, as he got eyes on the bar. ‘Shots for all, fuck it.’

‘Fuck it,’ agreed Scott, grinning.

 

* * *

 

 

Derek never liked being Cora’s wingman. She was so much more confident than he was, and it was never comfortable seeing her get hit on, honestly. He stood awkwardly to one side at the bar as she flirted with not one but _two_ girls, a tall, elegant brunette and a shorter, dangerous looking redhead.

All he could think about was that fucking loser gamer who had gotten so under his skin. Was he trying to apologise to his ex, maybe bonding with him over the fact that they were almost obliterated in the first round? By Derek no less. He wanted to faceplant the bar until he passed out. Instead he settled for his fourth tequila and tried not to look utterly miserable.

‘Cheer up, dork.’ Cora had returned.

Derek raised an eyebrow. ‘Thought you’d found something to do for the night.’ He indicated the two girls, who were still nearby and talking quietly to each other.

Cora shrugged. ‘They’re together. But that’s not the point.’

‘I’ll bet,’ Derek said dryly, and she thumped his shoulder.

‘Shut up,’ she said, exasperated but smiling. ‘Listen. They’re friends with the Slinky.’

Derek cringed. ‘I hate hearing that out loud, Cora. I wish you’d just tell me his name.’

Cora held up two fingers to the barman, and indicated Derek’s glass. ‘I would,’ she said, ‘if it weren’t within your capabilities to ask him yourself.’

‘I don’t even know what he looks like,’ Derek said mournfully, eyeing the new shot of tequila in front of him doubtfully.

Cora downed her own and slammed the glass back down. ‘You will,’ she said simply, before turning to rejoin her new friends, leaving Derek by himself.

After two hours of stumbling around, getting hit on and immediately abandoned because he was clearly out of it, Derek decided to call it a night. Cora had disappeared, and he wasn’t even bothering to call her. He thought he’d seen Kira once, but she was wrapped around a pretty, fair-haired girl who was clearly the one responsible for all the sexiles, and Derek was in no frame of mind for that introduction.

It was about 1am, so the streets were almost deserted except for a few like Derek who were too drunk to be indoors. He wandered in the general direction of campus, enjoying the cool night air on his skin and hoping he’d be clear-headed enough to play stupid video games with stupid jerks tomorrow.

‘Hey, Derek!’

Derek turned at the sound of a familiar voice slurring his name. It was the guy with the key, also known as the guy with the puking friend and the guy in the red hoody. The guy whose eyes were so warm and whose skin was so pale. 

Unfortunately, the guy looked angry, and totally steamed. Not a great combination.

‘We need to _talk.’_

Derek shrugged. ‘Fine, what?’ He so wasn’t in the mood for this.

 

* * *

 

 

‘Here we go,’ said Malia, watching from the smoking area of the bar across the street.

‘This could go terribly,’ Scott said, worried. ‘Are we sure we should let him do this while totally wasted?’

‘Relax,’ said Cora, standing between Allison and Lydia and looking _very_ comfortable. ‘Derek’s just as drunk. This can only end brilliantly.’

 

* * *

 

 

Stiles was equal parts angry and horny, and twice as drunk.

‘Ok, first of all, how dare you,’ he began, pointing finger already in action. ‘You blow hot and cold for _weeks_ , and then you don’t immediately ask me to be your teammate, and then you’re fucking up my ass for the whole fucking Smite tournament, I mean _really_ , what the _fuck_ is your _beef_.’ He took a deep breath to prepare for round two of Angry Rant Version #3, but Derek interrupted him.

‘Wait - _wait_ ,’ he said, holding up both hands as if to ward him off. He paused, as though he literally had to physically connect the dots in his brain. ‘So - so _you’re_ the Slinky?’

Stiles blinked, effectively derailed. ‘I’m - what did you just call me?’

A slow smile was spreading across Derek’s face. ‘Oh man, seriously? Um.’ He rubbed his face, looking sheepish. ‘It’s what Cora calls you - what we call you, I guess. Because we couldn’t pronounce your - ’

‘My gamertag, yeah,’ Stiles realised. ‘That’s - that’s a fucking stupid name.’

Derek snorted. ‘You’re telling me. Why the fuck couldn’t you have just told me your damn name?’

Stiles sighed, rubbing his face. ‘I don’t _know_ ,’ he complained. ‘You’re very difficult to think straight around.’

Derek raised an eyebrow. ‘We never met in person.’ Then he stopped. ‘Oh.’

Stiles glared at him, but there was a glint of humor in his eyes. ‘Yeah. Oh.’

‘Shit,’ Derek muttered. ‘I’m - ok, my bad. I was a jerk. But in my defence, I was thinking about you the whole time.’

Stiles choked on a laugh. ‘Right, I bet you say that to all the guys.’ Derek blushed, but he laughed too.

‘You know what I mean,’ he said, mortified.

‘Not really,’ grinned Stiles. ‘Maybe you should explain it to me further.’

Derek fixed him with a serious look. ‘I don’t go “further” with _any_ guy until I know their name,’ he said.

‘Oh yeah, is that your rule?’ Stiles teased, stepping closer, just a little.

Derek nodded. ‘That’s my rule. Sorry, can’t be broken.’

Stiles considered him. Now that he had Derek’s full attention, it was like he was speaking to a completely different guy. His eyes were fixed on Stiles, his face distractingly attractive, with shoulders Stiles just wanted to grab. He was definitely too horny for this, but he plunged on regardless.

‘I’m Stiles,’ he said, sticking out his hand. ‘Stiles Stilinski.’

Derek looked for a moment like he thought Stiles was fucking with him.

‘It’s better than Slinky, at least,’ he said, taking Stiles’ hand and shaking it.

Stiles snorted. ‘I’ll say. Who the fuck came up with - ’

The rest of his sentence got cut off as Derek yanked him forward into his arms. Stiles huffed in surprise, but was immediately silenced by Derek, who was kissing him.

The muffled cheers and catcalls from across the street barely registered with Stiles. Derek’s arms encircled him as they kissed, and the heat off him was incredible. Stiles wanted to wrap himself up in it and never emerge.

Derek’s lips were soft, if slightly uncoordinated from being about as drunk as Stiles, and the feeling of their bodies pressed together sent a feeling of heat and excitement right down into Stiles’ belly, making him shiver and press closer, opening his mouth and burying his hands in Derek’s hair.

It was altogether too passionate for two people who were drunk, standing in the middle of the street, and had technically just met for the first time. Someone yelled at them to take it elsewhere. Stiles flipped them the bird without opening his eyes.

‘Does - does this mean you’ll be my teammate now?’ Stiles asked, dazed, when they finally broke apart. Derek threw back his head and laughed.

 

* * *

 

 

Epilogue:

 

‘Why did it have to be _Trials_ ,’ Stiles sighed, as he wiped out yet again. They were practising for the final tomorrow, and honestly they didn’t have a prayer.

Derek’s hand squeezed the back of his neck. ‘I’d almost prefer to lose,’ he said. ‘I’m genuinely afraid of what Cora will do to me if I beat Lydia.’

‘Well good, cos we’re gonna lose!’ said Stiles cheerfully. They were curled up on the couch in Derek’s blissfully empty dorm room, the remnants of a sex-filled weekend all around them; clothes, half-eaten food containers, and lube.

‘Nah, I’m too good,’ Derek said easily, picking up his controller for another attempt. Stiles was half sitting on him, feeling loose and warm, wearing Derek’s sweatpants and t-shirt, and Derek pressed a kiss to his neck, stubble scraping deliciously, before starting the game.

‘Mm, you are good,’ said Stiles, watching him. He loved the feeling of Derek’s chest rising and falling against him.

‘I’m actually pretty casual,’ Derek said. ‘I only started playing video games to meet cute guys.’

Stiles laughed, delighted when he felt Derek laughing quietly too. ‘Well, if you meet any, let me know.’

He squeezed Derek’s thigh, and Derek immediately wiped out.

‘Oops,’ said Stiles innocently.

‘You distracted me,’ accused Derek.

Stiles turned around and sat himself in Derek’s lap, grinding down pointedly. ‘Maybe you need a little distraction,’ he said, draping his arms around Derek’s neck. ‘If you’re going to be distracted by my admittedly very alluring presence, you’ll never win tomorrow.’

Derek raised an eyebrow, smiling. ‘You’ll be playing too, remember?’

Stiles shrugged. ‘Eh, I’m average.’

‘You can’t even say that with a straight face.’

Stiles grinned. ‘I know, who am I kidding. I’m awesome.’

Derek kissed him, and Stiles thought the thing he loved the most was the feel of Derek’s lips smiling against his own.

That didn’t stop him from grinding mercilessly on Derek the whole time he played, refusing to let him come until Derek had finished the round with zero faults. It took a while, but neither of them really minded.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on [tumblr](http://thetrojeans.tumblr.com/) and [twitter](http://twitter.com/lazarusthefirst/)


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